Movies & TV

We’ve all argued it vehemently while playing License to Kill, Slappers Only mode: which Bond wins in a Battle Royal? It’s a complicated issue. Certainly, we have our favorite and least favorite Bonds (cough, Moore, cough), but beyond cheesy storylines and awful Tarzan vine-swinging moments, pure and utter deadliness is tough to rank. While we’re...

A fine movie poster adds color and character to a blank wall, but it also reveals a lot about you. Austin Powers smiles goofily from your den? You’re groovy baby, yea. Is Jason Bourne giving the cold stink eye from above your bed? You take your action raw and you’re probably a realist. But a...

While it’s undeniably cool to adorn your home theater with minimalist or unique movie posters (like these, and these), we know your sound-proofed walls need art as nuanced as your taste in film itself. The Los Angeles Film Map (~$40) has you covered in every direction. Littered within its 24 x 32-inch borders are the...

Director Wes Anderson’s most recent (and perhaps most Wes Andersony) film to date, Moonrise Kingdom ($20), is now available on crystal-clear Blu-ray — obviously the best way to watch a movie that looks like it was shot on film equipment from the ‘60s. Featuring customary Anderson regulars Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman, the film also...

Since 2008, Slingbox has served as media middleman for TV-addicted travelers. Capitalizing on under-used, over-priced cable service was great at first, but standard definition streaming is something not even the lowest rent smartphones do anymore. The Slingbox 350 and 500 ($180+) give you your fix in full 1080p HD. The Slingbox 350 ($180) is the...

We promised to leave no steak unturned during our month of beef, and we’re men of our word. As it happens, beef’s got a thespian side that The Academy repeatedly fails to acknowledge. Our budget for gold statues was blown on jerky and skillets, but that won’t stop us from proposing a new award category...

Skyfall is about to touch down in theaters, which means the promotional tie-in machine is flipping every switch on its weapons panel. Still, the James Bond 007 Miniature Vehicles Set ($60) is an interesting keepsake for Fleming fans, featuring eight miniature die-cast models of select Bond vehicles from the 22-film series. While we wouldn’t lump...

Ridley Scott’s perpendicularly plot-lined meta-prequel to Alien may have polarized fanboys, but no one can deny the beauty and complexity of Prometheus’s planetary vistas. While HD digital downloads have already been dropping jaws for quite some time, the upcoming Blu-ray release promises to also answer a few of your lingering questions. In addition to the...

The superhero movie of the century is now ready to blow up your living room. Naturally, you’d expect top notch audio and video quality, and the Blu-ray version ($20) won’t disappoint — especially for 3D fans looking to recreate the theater experience at home. There’s also plenty of intriguing extras to enhance the second go...

If your fandom/fantasy addiction borders on the insane, NFL Game Rewind ($35+) will only steepen a downward spiral of screaming at the television. The online service allows subscribers to replay any game from the 2009-2011 and current regular season on their computer or tablet. If you only bleed blank & blank colors, you can also...

Get your fix for random philosophical dialogue and extreme violence with the newly announced Tarantino XX Blu-ray set. True fans might recognize a bit of double-dipping on the part of the studios here, since the new collection is essentially an augmented version of the Quentin Tarantino Collection that was available only overseas. The new XX...

Fear and Desire, celebrated director/producer Stanley Kubrick’s first attempt at film making, is a must-have for film aficionados. The movie follows four soldiers caught behind enemy lines as they battle, physically and psychologically, to return to safety. Directed, produced, shot and edited by a 24-year-old Kubrick, the Howard Sackler screenplay is intriguing in its examination...

If you’ve made the jump to 3D TV, the visually stunning Avatar Blu-ray 3D Collector’s Edition ($28) should be on your must-have list. This edition gives you all three dimensions of the the Pocahontas remake, which is finally available outside of Panasonic 3D TV bundles this October. Unfortunately, the visual orgasm comes only in the...

America is no stranger to epic blockbuster action movies — hell, we invented the genre. But one viewing of the Indonesian film The Raid: Redemption ($20) left us questioning Hollywood’s chops as the king of adrenaline. Its premise is beautifully streamlined: an elite squad of 20 SWAT members is sent in to take down Jakarta’s...

Real, life-affirming creations of art that come along at the right place at the right time to transform culture as we know it are… well, rare. Jaws is such a masterpiece, and one that has captivated audiences for nearly forty years. The film struck a chord through cutting edge effects, a genius score, and of...

Hitchcock’s role in the evolution of film needs no introduction, but his movies have been in desperate need of a little TLC in the age of high-def. Alfred Hitchcock: The Masterpiece Collection ($299) is poised to be the damn-near-definitive Hitchcock release, updating the previous DVD version to glorious 1080p with DTS-HD Master Audio. Specifically, the...

If you’ve ever dreamt of being Short Round and yelling “Docta Jones, Docta Jones!” to an adoring Indy (everyone has that recurring fantasy, right?), then Indiana Jones: The Complete Adventures Blu-ray ($75) should be on your pre-order list like Henry Jones, Sr. on that Nazi knockout Dr. Elsa Schneider. Modern-day films just don’t make male...

Whether he’s starting an Irish Revolution, fighting kidnappers, mentoring Batman, or starring in a George Lucas debacle, we love us some Liam Neeson. In The Grey, Neeson plays John Ottway, a remote oil company worker (with a very particular set of skills, of course) whose plane goes down in an Alaskan blizzard. Ottway leads the...

Think of Mallory Kane (played by MMA Fighter, Gina Carano) as Jason Bourne with a functioning memory and some sweet heels. Carano comes alive in this action-thriller by acclaimed director Steven Soderbergh. As hired heavy for a private black bag ops firm working for the United States Government, Kane is betrayed by the very people...

After being out of print for what seems like an eternity, The Beatles’ 1968 animated hit, Yellow Submarine has finally been digitally restored for DVD and Blu-ray. Getting the Blue Meanies all primped up and ready for their 1080p debut apparently was no easy feat. In fact, each frame of the film was restored by...

Our insincere condolences to Hunger Games fans everywhere. This week we’re celebrating the release of the 70th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray of Casablanca ($45). Thanks to the Michael Bays and James Camerons of today, movies have certainly come a long way since 1942 in terms of production value. Yet this timeless classic continues to shape generations...

While most assumed Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was bound for success the moment it went into production, thanks to a combination of elite UK actors and one of the best spy-thrillers ever put to paper as a basis for a script, we were still skeptical. Call us George Smiley’s, but director Tomas Alfredson, after all,...

Your bracket is filled. Your jersey is washed. You’ve grafted a Camelback onto your spine to counterbalance the upcoming spike in weekday drinking. It’s March Madness time and the NCAA’s March Madness Live service is the best way to catch literally all of the action. Ponying up for the $3.99 subscription gets you access to...

Some say the “Golden Era” of 3D cinema was in the 50s after Edwin H. Land developed a linear polarizing projection system and a set of companion glasses to view the format. The system used two projectors, placed behind different polarizing filters, to superimpose two images shot from slightly different perspectives onto the same screen....

Drive confidently swerves around pigeonholes. Pink scripted credits, seemingly plucked from an 80s billboard, burn over opening shots of the LA skyline, right before plunging into a tense getaway that would make Michael Mann grin from ear to ear. The protagonist — whose proper name is never revealed throughout the entire flick — barely speaks...

Cancer is poor topic for a comedy, but then again, humor has always served as tent pole for those suffocating under grief. 50/50 also isn’t your generic, “let’s get edgy” script, because its writer Will Reiser was actually diagnosed with spine cancer, and his real life friend, Seth Rogan, actually stood by him through the...

MGM has announced the mother of all boxed sets in celebration of 50 years of James Bond wooing women, breaking gadgets, and thwarting global disaster on the silver screen. Never before have all 22 films been available in high definition Blu-ray and compiled into one epic collectors item that’s truly a must have for any...

Here’s a nice concept for the cinephile. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a service, like Netflix or Hulu, that pooled and sent you (or that you could choose from) great independent films to discover and watch — all for just a few bucks? Well, there is. It’s called Prescreen, a start-up video-on-demand platform...

Contagion is a germophobe’s worst nightmare. Director Steven Soderbergh and his usual team tackle a well-worn niche, ploughed by titles like Outbreak, to create a pandemic horror story that will leave most viewers running to stockpile Purell and hesitant to enter airports. Much of its success comes from a grounded depiction of how the world’s...

Midnight in Paris features plenty of Woody Allen trademarks, while avoiding many of the quirks that have irritated us about his work in the past. “Pair-eee” has rarely looked so good in a film and leaves viewers pining to hop a plane to de Gaulle as soon as the credits roll. The cast boasts a...

When it comes to Brazilian cinema, it doesn’t get any bigger than City of God. After its release in 2002, the outstanding film based on true events quickly stormed the international film community, grabbing four academy award nominations in the process thanks to its raw depiction of life in the slums of the notorious Rio...

Despite what the posters say, Our Idiot Brother is less of a roll-on-the-floor-comedy, and more of a feel-good-indie. That doesn’t mean you won’t laugh out loud while watching though (the parole officer conversations and an attempted threesome are particularly rich moments). Loaded with generation X stars including Paul Rudd, Elizabeth Banks, Zooey Deschanel, Rashida Jones...

While Steven Spielberg has been busy wearing in his boots as the bankroller of nearly every mega-budget Sci-Fi production over the last few years, we’ve personally missed him behind the camera. Thankfully, J.J. Abrams has been methodically honing his Spielberg impersonation skills with each passing film he’s directed. Super 8 was certainly his best outing...

Bellflower is the debut film by Evan Glodell, who in many ways exhibits hints of both a young James Cameron and Quentin Tarantino. Like “the king of the world”, Glodell has a love for the mechanical — he built his own specialized camera to film Bellflower, as well as many of the movie’s ridiculous anarchist...

Terrance Malick’s fifth film The Tree of Life ($25) is a strange beast, to say the least. At Cannes, it was booed by some during its press screening, but went on to take the Palme d’Or. Established reviewers split in a similar fashion, with some crowning it as a profound and moving exploration of human...

Two epic miniseries, in 1080p, produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, in one limited edition box set. That about sums up the Band of Brothers & Pacific Blu-ray Box Set ($135) which is slated to hit shelves on November 8th. Whether you’ve caught the occasional re-run on the History Channel, or missed these series...

When you get the money, then you get the $700 limited edition Scarface Blu-ray. Then, when you get the power and Blu-ray, then you get the women. That’s probably not the exact curriculum of the Tony Montana life coaching system, but we’re pretty sure he’d still splurge on this ridiculous version of Brian De Palma’s...

MoviePass is a brand new startup hoping to revolutionize the way film addicts get their regular dose o’ big screen. For $50 bucks a month, clients can enjoy an unlimited number of movies. Everything works via an app, which is available for both Android and iOS users. Through it, users can reserve seats and simply...

You all know the lines, scenes and what Shooter eats for breakfast, but for more than a decade, anyone hoping for a rage-fueled trip through the PGA circa 1996 has had to put up with standard def. The wait is over starting tomorrow. Yup, Adam Sandler’s instant-classic Happy Gilmore ($20) has finally received a 1080p...

It’s official, the chock-a-blockbuster season has arrived. But, not all brain stimulus is lost. Coming out of nowhere and already sweeping awards for its mesmerizing cinematography, General Orders No.9 is a documentary unlike you’ve ever seen. For 11 years, writer-director Bob Persons has captured the markers of loss and change in the American South and...

The Dude would surely approve of the leisurely 10+ years it’s taken the Cohen Brothers to release their cult-classic on Blu-ray. Based on what’s included in the newly announced, limited edition version ($21), however, — the extended patience from fans will be paid back in full. For starters, the studio announced that the film has...

Le Mans is a movie that was driven by passion, instead of the bottom line. Steve McQueen desperately wanted the film made to showcase his talents as a actor and driver, and authentically at that. Subsequently, he dumped millions of his own cash into the film, which nearly bankrupted him. The way he saw it,...

James Franco may have trouble delivering teleprompter lines realistically, but you shouldn’t let his Oscar hosting skills dissuade you from watching his excellent performance in 127 Hours ($20). If you happened to miss the memo on Danny Boyle’s latest masterpiece, Franco plays the role of outdoor legend Aron Ralston, who earned his notoriety by sawing...

Before Christopher Nolan was a mega-star director, he made Memento, based off a short story written by his brother, Jonathan Nolan. If you’ve never seen this cinematic mind-bender, you should, because it’s his finest work to date in our humble opinion. This film was released originally in 2002 on Blu-ray, but that copy was done...